Indians – Come To Your Census

Posted on February 21, 2011

There are 354,552 Asian people in New Zealand (2006), of which 104,583 are of Indian origin. This growing community needs government resources to be allocated. And for this reason, it is important that they are counted in the upcoming 2011 census.

Census information helps determine how billions of dollars of government funding is spent in the community.

The 2011 Census is in full swing, with the delivery of close to eight million census forms and Internet Access Codes to nearly two million households around New Zealand. New Zealand population is 4.2 million.

In the lead-up to census day (8 March), 7000 census collectors – the largest temporary workforce in the country, will be tasked with this mammoth job.

To make the job easier, New Zealand Statistics also use online channel to count the Kiwi population.

Census General Manager Carol Slappendel says one of the main challenges of delivering the census forms is New Zealand’s rural and often isolated nature.

Carol Slappendel says the 2011 Census will be the biggest census undertaken in New Zealand yet, and people can opt for the secure, quick and easy option of filling in their forms online.

To encourage participation, the Dunedin Public Libraries have joined forces with the ‘Computers in Homes’ digital literacy programme to provide community Census sites, where people can complete their 2011 Census online.

Providing further impetus to the digital census participation is “Come To Your Census”, a campaign to encourage communities to complete their census forms online, by the 2020 Communications Trust. People with an internet connection at home can complete their census forms after they receive their documents.

However, Statistics New Zealand have a problem on hand. Overstayers are not keen to participate in the census, according a ONE News report.

“If I get caught by the immigration or police I’ll be deported back to the islands,” one overstayer told the television news programme. There are reportedly 15,000 overstayers in New Zealand and many of them are too afraid to put their address on anything, including the census form, as per the news report.

Close of the heals of New Zealand census which is conducted every five years, India is getting ready to count its 1.2 billion people in one of the world’s largest census exercises. India conducts its census once in 10 years, and its 2011 census is being described as the largest peace-time mobilisation in the world.

The Indian census will employ 2.7 million staff to cover 7,742 towns and 600,000 villages. In addition to being the most expensive census exercise in the country’s 64-year history, there’s one more ‘first’ for the country driven by caste politics. The Indian census commission will, for the first time, ask for respondents’ caste.